Over the past 13 years, thanks to Valentyn Revenko, principal of Kirovohrad’s Music School No. 2, a school completion of young composers in memory of the outstanding Ukrainian composer Yulii Meitus, a fellow countryman, has turned into a full-scale festival Classik-Proekt.
This year’s fest comprised excursions to the museums of such music figures as Heinrich Neuhaus, Karol Szymanowski, and Yulii Meitus; a soiree of Ukrainian solo singing (at the Art Museum); a performance of the Kirovohrad Municipal Choir directed by Yurii Liubovych (at the Local History Museum); and a gala concert of musical premieres (Kirovohrad Music College). It was a surprise for the participants to see a video greeting from the Canadian musicologist Marko Stech and the presentation of his documentary film on Yulii Meitus, a composer at Les Kurbas’s legendary theater Berezil. The film uses materials from the Meitus People’s Memorial Museum.
The well-known Ukrainian composer Hanna Havrylets, who chaired the jury of the children’s composer contest, became the festival’s main heroine. Her choral compositions (particularly, “Blow, Gentle Wind” sung by the Municipal Choir, “The Holy Virgin” performed by the Prima Vista choir conducted by Oksana Trushyna), symphonies (“A Look into Childhood” set to the Orchestra of Folk Instruments by its conductor Bohdan Maksymenko), and chamber pieces (in particular, “Choral” performed by the college’s chamber orchestra conducted by Natalia Khylobokova) became a true discovery for the general public and caused a real explosion of interest in this lady, one of the most brilliant artists of today.
The young composers’ contest has now assumed a somewhat different shape due to quarantine in the city – the contenders presented the videoed performances of their works, which testified to keen interest on the part of not only the teen composers, but also their parents, while the compositions in general showed a considerable skill of their authors.
Out of the 32 participants, the 12-year-old Ivan Rudik from Svitlovodsk, who composed some interesting little pieces for saxophone and drum, won the Grand Prix. What added more heat to the fest was the performance of the Kyiv-based provocative band Shpyliasti Kobzari, which won the packed house with an interactive manner of communication and a witty arrangement of world hits for the bandura ensemble. In a worthy response to Kyiv’s virtuosos, Anastasia Reshetniak, the first prize winner, inspiringly played a composition from the collection of the band’s frontman Yaroslav Dzhus.
Thanks to the leading composers who chaired the jury in various years (including Bohdana Filtz, Zhanna and Levko Kolodub, Viktor Stepurko, et al.) and the Kyiv performers (this time it was Anastasia Pototska, a former music school pupil and now a National Music Academy of Ukraine student), Classik-Proekt has long overstepped the regional limits and assumed the importance of a major national-level art and education event.
Iryna Sikorska is a music expert
